


my heart is thrilled by the still of your hand

by deandratb



Category: One Day at a Time (TV 2017)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Internal Monologue, Post-Canon, dad!Schneider feels
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-11-15 14:38:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18075290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deandratb/pseuds/deandratb
Summary: Schneider's father visiting changes everything.Starts with Pen's musings during "The Man" and continues post-canon.She had no idea he could be the man who kicked his jerk of a father out without hesitating. For just a second, it was like Schneider filled up the room.





	my heart is thrilled by the still of your hand

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bethanyactually](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bethanyactually/gifts).



> Happy birthday to one of my favorite people ever!! <3 I'm sleep-deprived and posting this with less editing than usual because I'm already in the middle of the next chapter, so...please excuse any errors. :)

**“The Alvarezes are gonna be okay. And so are we.”**

It was the start of something, reaching for his hand.

She’d never done so before. Schneider was usually the one who did the reaching, the risking...and Penelope liked it that way.

But she needed the connection, and with their fight still echoing behind them, she knew Schneider wouldn’t invade her space unless she gave him the opening.

Besides, it helped--it made it a little easier to offer him the truth like a second apology. He was such a warm, present person; Schneider grounded her without even trying.

The least she could do was be honest. Make it clear that he mattered, that he was more than his father’s son. That he belonged to  **them**  just as much as the cold world he came from, if not more.

With his hand in hers, Schneider would listen, because he always listened. He always forgave. This was the worst fight they’d ever had, and Penelope was finally starting to see the cracks that got left behind when they just moved on instead of trying to repair the damage.

Schneider was really good at papering over them, the same way he brushed off his father’s abuse, his childhood neglect. But she wanted better for him than that. He deserved better. He deserved to know he was loved, to not have to doubt it.

It stuck with her, the way Schneider had protested when Penelope told him he wasn’t really family. The way he’d tried to approach her, to keep talking. She didn’t have to see his face as he left to know how he must have looked--like a kicked golden retriever, loyal and confused and scared but never, ever fighting back.

After Mateo finished going over her finances, giving her the breakdown along with some much-needed _\--if not entirely welcome--_ perspective, Penelope had remembered all the times Schneider let her into his apartment without hesitation, all the times she took him for granted because he seemed happy to let her.

She got so angry at herself for that, that it made her mad at him, too.

 _Why didn’t he stand up for himself? Why didn’t he **ever**?_ If Schneider had gotten mad back, told her off, she would’ve listened--if only because it would’ve been such a shock.

But no, he just went when she told him to go, and accepted when she came back to apologize, and looked at her with all that trust and hope swimming in his eyes.  _Just like always._

It felt different this time, sitting there on his couch. She felt different. Because Schneider was important to her, and the possibility that he might not know it? That he might not trust it anymore?

That was on her.

So, she told him. 

 **“I like the man you are just fine.”**  

 _Please don’t change,_ Penelope added silently, staring him down through her tears--hoping he got it.  _Please don’t let anyone, even me, convince you that you need fixing._

Schneider managed the tiniest of smiles in response, still gripping her hand, but mostly he stared back as though he was waiting for the other shoe. As though it might stop being true if he blinked. His expression was so open, so full of raw emotion... _so Schneider..._ it was a relief when he pulled her in for a hug. 

Penelope didn’t have to look at him then, didn’t have to watch all his feelings as they happened, trying to tug at her own.  _For a guy with a gambling problem, he seriously had no poker face._

She could feel the tension in their hug, where normally there was none. He was quick to offer her his arm or a shoulder, whenever she needed it, but in such a casual way--this was something else. This was because  **he**  needed it, because he needed to know they were really okay. 

So it mattered, that Penelope had initiated the contact first, that she’d made things right again, enough that Schneider could hold on even after his father came back into the room. 

She might not know Schneider’s father very well, but she could guess what he thought about ‘real men’ and hugging. It was her who let go first, drying her eyes while Schneider took another moment. His hand stayed on her back long enough that she was surprised his father didn’t comment.

 _Maybe he didn’t notice._ Penelope was pretty sure Schneider’s dad had mentally lumped her in with the hired help as soon as he knew she wasn’t Avery, rendering her invisible.

Still, fading back to give Schneider space to talk to his father wasn’t easy. The protective part of her wanted to tell the man exactly where he could stick his ideas about Schneider and their building. 

And hearing her own thoughts, Penelope realized suddenly that was how she felt about it. Somehow, in the face of someone like Lawrence Schneider, she and Schneider had become a ‘they.’ She was itching to step in, to be a united front. 

It wasn’t her place--but the impulse was there. 

Penelope wished she could blame it on the hugging, the handholding, the whole freaking day. Nearly losing her best friend and finding out she was losing her home.  _Watching Schneider turn into someone else and realizing how much she hated it. Having to face what that meant, how much she really did appreciate who he was the rest of the time._

If that was all it was, an emotional reaction to the closeness and the clearing of the air, then it would be a fluke, easily dismissed.

She really wished it could be dismissed that easily.

She used to be able to dismiss  **Schneider**  that easily. Brushing off his compliments, rejecting his flirtations, hinting that he was around too much. It used to make her feel slightly more in control of a life that had been spiraling. 

2016′s Penelope couldn’t save her marriage or keep her kids in line or ever get her  _Mami_ to listen, but she could lay down the law with her overly-involved landlord. 

Sometimes, it even worked.

They were so far past that now, Penelope knew there was no going back. Watching Schneider finally snap and kick his father out right in front of her made that clear.

_She didn’t even get the chance to take her earrings off._

Even though Schneider was one of the most important people in her life, he had the oddest ability to be more like a mirror than a person, sometimes. 

He knew what made her panic, and what haunted her dreams--how to calm her down or how to cheer her up. And through all that, Penelope didn’t know him nearly as well as he knew her. She hadn’t even realized it until Schneider was standing there in his open-collar dress shirt, watching wide-eyed as his father left.

**“That was freaking amazing! Where did that come from?!?”**

Schneider was a lot of things, but  _tough_  was not a word she would have ever used to describe him. Until now.

Everything was changing this year. Avery was his first serious relationship, the first woman he’d ever let beneath the surface.  _Besides her._

And then his father came to visit, and it was like she finally, really saw him. Not just the cheerful geek with endless hobbies and unlimited compassion, but the man underneath that. Who struggled. Whose life was not easy, despite all the money.

Schneider was a different person around his dad, and not one she liked. But if anybody understood trying to live up to parental expectations, wilting under family judgement, holding on to any chance of a future...it was Penelope.

As much as it sucked to watch her best friend disappear into a suit and his best corporate manners, it was something else, to see him come back. Stronger. 

Penelope would have been the first to admit that Schneider possessed a quiet, unassuming sort of strength. The kind that kept him sober for the last eight years, that kept him going. It was appealing, in the same sweet way he was.

She had no idea he could be the man who kicked his jerk of a father out without hesitating. For just a second, it was like Schneider filled up the room.

And though she would die before admitting it to anyone else, that was even sexier than _Quinces_ Schneider. So she couldn’t blame her feelings on a fluke. 

Maybe the real start had been months earlier when Schneider became her best defense against anxiety attacks, always ready with animal memes or to rush to her side when she needed it.

Or before that, when she hurt his feelings and he forgave her--the first time, when it wasn’t even really an argument so much as Schneider letting her lash out without defending himself.

Or when she saw him without the beard and glasses and realized he could actually look like a guy. The kind of guy she would grab a drink with...and maybe make it to a seventh date.

Or when he brought Alex back safe and acted like he deserved to be banished forever because he couldn’t keep a teenager from looking for trouble.

_Or, or, or._

It was easy to get tangled up in the history between them, the gradual shift from acquaintances to friends to family, and lose sight of the bigger picture. However much things had changed since she met him--and re-met him--they were changing again whether Penelope welcomed it or not.

**“Family's everything.”**

There was so much weight in Schneider’s words, in his smile, in the way he was able to look sad and happy simultaneously like no one else she had ever met.

The handholding and the hugging were more than enough for one day--too much, even. What Penelope needed to do was move things back to steady ground. To the familiar.

But he was so full of love standing there, with no expectation of anything. It radiated out of him. 

It pulled her in. 

Schneider had been her safe space for a long time now, but he’d never had a gravitational pull all his own.  _That had to be why she felt off-balance, right?_

It was hard to pull herself out of the hug, when all Penelope wanted was to stay instead. And wanting that was so weird after the day they’d had, she stepped back again, almost immediately.

**“Hey, you want to come over for dinner?”**

Even that was new, actually inviting him. Usually, it was enough, waiting to see if he would show up. Usually, he did. 

But after the fight, and the talk, and the all-of-it, Penelope wasn’t willing to wait and see. She didn’t want to leave open the possibility of him spending his night somewhere else. 

_She didn’t want to spend her night without him._

Penelope could still feel the warmth of his arms around her, the realization hitting her nearly as hard as that Ice Bucket Challenge after Schneider had talked her into it: she had actually been underselling it, when she told Schneider she liked who he was. 

She liked him so much more than she ever could’ve predicted she would. 

As quickly as her mind, and heart, veered into new and alarming territory, the cold shock of reality followed, bringing her back to her senses.

He was her best friend. He was her  **family**.

_He was with somebody else._

**“You can invite Avery.”**

Penelope hurried to add that on, segueing into a promise of cookies and her family’s company, hoping he might not notice her slight flush. 

Hoping it wasn’t written all over her face how much she needed him to say yes.

She had to tell her _Mami_ and the kids the good news, and make sure they set enough places at the table. She had to give herself a stern talking to about mixing friendship and attraction and stress and love together and getting it all confused. 

Penelope was too caught up in her own thoughts to worry about Schneider staying behind. 

Later, she would remember seeing the case his father gave him, still sitting in his living room.

Later, she would remember that Schneider didn’t sing and dance along with her as she left. 

There would be plenty of time for her to catalog all the red flags she should have noticed, once it was too late. 

And making lists in her head at night, of all the ways she’d failed him as a friend when he’d needed her most...well, at least that kept her from thinking about how Schneider had pulled her into him, how she had wanted to keep holding on.

_For a while, anyway._

**Author's Note:**

> Title borrowed from "There's No Plan" by Hozier.


End file.
